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2022-2023 Undergraduate Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]
Course Descriptions
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University Seminar |
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US 272 Getting It Off Your Chest
This course is designed to develop students’ skills in writing editorials, Op-Eds, personal essays, columns, online writing, broadcast essays, as well as music, movie, and restaurant reviews and to give them insight into advocacy journalism and writing. Students will be exposed to various research and writing techniques essential to editorial writing and will be encouraged to publish their Op-Eds in newspapers and on websites.
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US 273 Visual Propaganda of Armed Conflict
Armed conflicts have occurred in the historical record for thousands of years and the use of propaganda to support such endeavors has occurred nearly as long. While the development of new weapons technology and combat tactics has evolved over centuries, the use of propaganda has been present to justify the conflict, recruit participants, raise national awareness, or to present images of war to the population. Some of these images have become the most iconic of our time. From the early photography used during the U.S. Civil War, propaganda posters of the World Wars, the televised images of Vietnam, to the images of today, the use of propaganda in armed conflict has impacted the way individuals perceive armed conflicts around the globe. In this class, students will explore the complex dynamics of conflict with a focus on evaluating the impact of propaganda. Utilizing primary and secondary sources, the students will gather information on the strategic use of propaganda and examine its psychological, artistic, and nationalistic elements.
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US 274 Witches & Warriors: Powerful Women in Pop Culture
Witches and female warriors offer two of the most iconic representations of powerful women in pop culture. Though these representations are often contested, debated, and tied to desirability, they also shape the way that our modern culture views feminine strength. This course will combine visual representations of witches and warriors in fiction with a variety of critical readings and seminar-style discussions to analyze the various ways that feminine power is represented in stories such as Aliens, The Witches of Eastwick, Xena, Wicked, and Star Wars to name a few. We will explore theoretical and archetypal concepts of beauty, sexuality, and power to establish working definitions of these concepts so that we may then apply them to the visual representations of iconic female characters of film, television, theater, and comics. Using theories from cultural studies, film and gender studies, and literary studies, we will explore how the cultural legacy of feminine power is tied to our notions of gender, race, social status, sexuality, identity, and agency.
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US 275 Scientific Ethics
This course focuses on the interactions of science and technology with societal values and ethics. Different ethical systems are examined to provide context for diverse perspectives. While scientific knowledge provides factual information on what is known and is possible, decisions on the application of technology are dependent upon a society’s acceptance or restrictions. Topics will include contemporary value conflicts associated with the distribution of and access to the benefits and burdens of modern technologies such as energy production, stem cell therapy, and genetic engineering.
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US 276 The Secret Symbols of Pop Culture
This course provides an in-depth exploration of the way we are constantly manipulated in movies, television shows, art, and advertisements through the use of mystic and religious symbols, names, and even colors. In this seminar, students are given a survey of the following topics: heroes’ journeys, heroines’ journeys, alchemy, ring composition, morality plays, mythology, Christian symbolism, and the symbolism used by the Mormon, Buddhist, and Jewish traditions. The class is progressive and the pieces used in turn become more complex so that students may see multiple layers of symbolism. In addition, students keep a journal, collecting images associated with each week’s topic. At the end of the course, they use their knowledge to create an original work, layering multiple levels of symbolism into the work.
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US 279 Environmental Science & Policy
This seminar explores environmental pollution, its underlying sciences—toxicology, pollution chemistry, and environmental science—and the law and regulations governing pollution, looking to see the links between these two disciplines. Lectures, in-class exercises, and a project (report and presentation) for groups of students will provide the students with an understanding of the current state of law and science on pollution.
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US 280 Exploring Entrepreneurship in the Arts
This course explores the relationship between art making and entrepreneurship with an active focus on self-discovery. Using the seminar format, classes consist of group discussions, lectures, projects, independent work (readings/videos), guest speakers, and field trips. The course has an online syllabus and website, including electronic versions of all readings/texts, links to artists, writers, theorists, galleries, business people, films, videos, case studies, and other online content; accounting and marketing software, e-commerce, social media, etc. Course content is organized into three units. “Unit I. Models” includes a historical and visual survey of entrepreneurship in the arts, including visual, theoretical, and quantitative analyses of artist/entrepreneur case studies, guest speakers, and online resources. In “Unit II: Creative Notions: Philosophies/Ethics/Commerce,” students address the questions and concepts raised in the process of blending art with commodity, contracts, copyright, intellectual property, budgeting, and financial statements. In “Unit III: Practice: Business Planning for a Creative Enterprise,” students carry out a practical application of course concepts by creating a business plan, using both visual and quantitative reasoning in their arts-entrepreneurial business plan development.
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US 282 Silence
Our culture values sound, voice, music, and noise. Unaware of our own senses in the midst of modern life, we have lost the meaning of silence. Silence is always defined in negative terms, as absence of sound, as a void and as a gap to be filled. We are not comfortable with silence. This course examines the philosophical meaning of silence across cultural and religious traditions. We will ask a number of questions: What is silence? How do other cultures understand silence? What is the place of silence in Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, Christianity and Islam? Are paintings silent? Are images silent? Is there a place for silence in architecture? Can/must we travel far away in search of silence? Is it possible to find/seek silence? How do we understand silence on its own terms? Did sound technology destroy silence? Is silence an environmental issue? Is death an experience of silence? How did modernism change our understanding and experience of silence?
Prerequisite: Sophomore standing or higher.
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US 283 Walking
This course is about “learning to walk” in our thinking, in the spaces around us and in the two cities near us: Philadelphia and New York City. We will learn from Jean-Jacques Rousseau how to become advocates for walking for contemplation. We will follow Walter Benjamin’s path as flâneurs in the spaces around us. This course explores the philosophy and the politics of walking. In addition to essays, philosophical works, travelogues, maps of our living spaces, and films, we will reflect on one of the most urgent philosophical and political issues of our time. Exercises will include essays, group symposia, walking diaries, and examining the relationship between walking and representation in film.
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US 284 Arts Leadership and Management
This seminar explores topics related to arts and culture leadership and management. Course content focuses on practical skills necessary for careers as professional artists, curators, administrators, and leaders of arts and culture organizations. This includes administrative principles, program development, practical applications, and trends in the current arts and cultural environment. Topics will also include principles of nonprofit management and structures, concise business writing, grant writing, demographics research, fundraising, arts education, ethical practice in community-based arts programs, marketing, communications, and leadership styles. The course will include established and emerging arts leaders as key guest speakers.
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US 286 Myths, Metaphors, and Morals in the Whedonverse
Joss Whedon—an American television and film screenwriter, director, and producer—has become one of the most iconic and influential movers of pop culture. He is the creator of multiple cult shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, and Dollhouse and has been intimately involved in major film franchises including Toy Story, and The Avengers. Currently, Joss Whedon has more scholarly books and articles written about him and his artistic visions than any other living writer today. Buffy the Vampire Slayer debuted as a TV series in 1997 and is to this day considered one of the most artistic and metaphor-ridden shows to successfully document the teenage experience. How did the show reach this level of cultural importance and popularity? Can we understand its rise and appeal through deconstruction? In this course we will be studying Joss Whedon as a writer, artist, and director. We will explore the artistry behind his shows, attempt to understand the ways he drew on myth and created lasting images and storylines that feel timeless, as well as explore the underlying morals that seem to guide his storytelling choices. We will explore the psychology, mythology, philosophy, feminism, writing, and directorial choices of one of today’s most important storytellers.
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US 287 Short Story and Photography
This course will examine that relationship through a close reading of several short stories by figures such as Julio Cortázar, Italo Calvino, John Updike, Raymond Carver, Cynthia Ozick, William Faulkner, Bing Xin, Dorris Dörrie, E. Annie Proulx and others. We will proceed with the thesis that the relationship between short story and photography arises out of one of the fundamental paradoxes of photography: photographs are borne as “moments in time,” but their survival depends on the irresistible and inevitable stories they generate. With that in mind, the course will include exercises in writing short stories as responses to existing and new photographs.
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US 288 Psychology of Music
This course examines central issues at the intersection of psychology and music. Students explore psychological and musical explanations of acoustics, perception, cognition, and memory; musical development and acquisition of expertise; communication of emotion and meaning; and the neuroscience of music. Together we also analyze musical examples from sociocultural and evolutionary psychology standpoints. Additionally, we will attend live musical performances and analyze these according to the course themes. Guided by the principles of psychology, students complete a capstone project involving a musical composition, performance, or analysis.
Prerequisite: Students should have the ability to read music or experience playing an instrument, or MU101.
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US 290 Science Fiction, Fantasy & the Environment
This course explores the ecological vision of selected fantasy and science fiction works (both literature and film). As a class, we will investigate how the alternate views of the environment presented in works of fantastic fiction encourage us to rethink our assumptions regarding the human-made problems affecting our environment today. We also use these works to examine our personal relationship towards the environment and consider the duty we have, if any, to help preserve and protect the world around us. Can fantastic fiction spur real world action? We will attempt to answer this question by reading excerpts from The Lord of the Rings and works by Ursula K. Leguin, Paolo Bacigalupi, and Ray Bradbury, among others. We will also watch several visual works, including the movie Soylent Green and Hayao Miyazaki’s Princess Mononoke.
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US 292 Sociology of the Simpsons
Using The Simpsons television show as a road map, this course will explore several social themes across American culture as they are portrayed in broadcast media, emphasizing and improving students’ own sociological imagination. The Simpsons is America’s longest running sitcom and has provided countless hours of entertainment while making community issues relevant and relatable. In this course we will examine many different social themes through the eyes and lives of the main characters and the universe that they occupy. Our emphasis will be on how wide the spectrum of social issues The Simpsons encroaches upon as well as how broadcast media uses vehicles like The Simpsons to discuss social issues and concerns affecting American society. Through assignments and readings, students will gain a deeper understanding and hopefully a new outlook on how social issues can be discussed openly and through the media. Students will employ their sociological imagination when they create a script for an episode of The Simpsons that involves a social concern. They will also have an opportunity to explore a social topic and its impact in broadcast media in more depth through several research assignments.
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US 293 Untapped: Exploring the Socio-Cultural and Scientific World of Beer
This course introduces students to the world of beer, by exploring the cultural, historical, social, and political dimensions of this beverage as well as the science and technology that is used in the brewing process. Students will trace the historical legacy of beer to several ancient empires (i.e., Mesopotamia, Aztec, Egypt, and China) and also evaluate the contemporary state of beer in the United States. Students will also examine the intersection of race, class, and gender in the production and consumption of beer. In addition to the cultural and historical coverage, students will also examine the brewing process by brewing their own beer at a local craft brewery, which will be evaluated by faculty and staff. Lastly, students will visit local craft breweries to further understand the brewing process and participate in a sensory evaluation.
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US 295 European Cinema: Politics, Melodrama, Entertainment
The class will focus on recent European cinema, in particular how popular genres (melodrama, comedy, etc.) reflect on the sociopolitical struggles of contemporary Europe. We will consider productions from several European countries (France, Italy, Germany, Spain, UK, etc.) to examine how such films comment on social reality in confronting issues that are challenging public opinion in Europe and around the world. We will examine how these films appeal to the audience’s emotional response, whether that is tears, laughter, anger, or fear. Social issues to be examined will include especially immigration and racism, economic crisis, class differences, and sexuality and gender expectations.
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US 299 World War I: History, Literature and Film
A little over a century ago, the Great War was raging. No one knew the death and destruction that would take place and certainly no one anticipated a sequel. Many current global trends and events can trace their origins to World War I. This seminar investigates the film and literature of World War I from contemporaries to the present. Classic literature from Remarque to Hemingway will be read and analyzed. Films from All Quiet on the Western Front to War Horse will be viewed to learn how the horrors of the war have been portrayed through the years. Students will inquire how documentaries about the war have changed from the mid-twentieth century to the twenty-first.
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